Strong Men

These past two weeks have been spent with a drastic increase in working hours for me. I was coaching gymnastics about 14 hours a week, but these past two weeks have been our annual summer gymnastics camp. I've actually gotten used to the alarm going off at seven, though I have been reaffirmed in the fact that having a full time job always feels like not having time to live. I need time for my close relationships so that I have time to pray without feeling pressured about the people I'm 'ignoring' by spending time with God. But this is not a reflection on full time work and how to balance life...I was struck by one of the gymnastics coaches this week, and the effect that he had on the gymnasts.

My group at camp is "Group One". They are the rec gymnasts--the ones mastering basic skills. They're my favorite, but not so well liked by many of the other coaches. However, one of the big, buff, super spotter guys has taken quite a liking to my group. You can always hear his voice booming across the gym. He is always 100% engaged while coaching them. He cheers them on. He jokes with them. He is the one shoving them out of their comfort zones.

I was most surprised the other day when he took a moment to correct some bad behaviors that had been going on. One girl had a perfect back handspring (jumping backwards to your hands and then going over) with a spot. I was spotting her, doing nothing, and trying to gently nudge her forward to doing it by herself. He saw what was going on, and came over and boomed, "You're a scardy cat! You're always baulking on things. You're too good to be baulking. You would have all these moves already if you weren't so scared all the time." My insides were squirming at the intensity. Then, she moved over to his station and he boomed at her again, this time adding, "If you baulk one more time on floor, every person in the gym is going to get 50 push-ups." This was loud enough for most of the 30 some girls in the gym to pay attention. But I was shocked...there were no tears, no drama, no nothing. The girl went on practicing without hesitating even one more time, completely confidently.

Another girl has been sitting on the sidelines with various minor injuries for the vast majority of the two weeks she's been here. This same coach came up to her and said, "What are you doing lying around?? You're the laziest kid in the gym." She protested that she wasn't, and that she was hurt. He just repeated, "You're the laziest kid here." This girl, also, was up and joining the group with no tears or visible hard feelings within thirty seconds.

Why is there no drama? Because the girls trust that this coach genuinely likes them for one. But I think there's something bigger...I think when a guy steps up and takes a stand like that, assuming that it's out of love and focus on the other person and not our of a temper...some of that strength actually gets passed on to the people he's working with. We need the people in our life who can take all the strength they have to tell us, "You're too good to be failing this way!" And, for whatever reason, when a guy is willing to do this, it brings a special kind of freedom. I wish we saw more male strength in our churches!

Influencing Younglings

Today I sat down to lunch with two of the other coaches, one of whom has a young daughter. She said to me, "Brooke said something funny yesterday...we were playing tennis and she came up to me and said, 'Mommy, I want you to sell our cars.'" The mom was confused about where this had come from until Brooke said, "Pamela walks and rides her bike to work. It's good for the earth. We should sell our cars."

Hee...I remember the girls reacting when they found out I didn't have a car yesterday, but I didn't figure this would translate so much into action. Yay for little kids and their hearts that are so ready to give up everything for what seems good!

Best. Birthday Present. Ever.

I got an email yesterday for my birthday! It was from Ayumi, one of my dear Japanese friends. Ayumi and I bonded over computer slideshows of our trips to Africa. She's the one who told me how to get to India to volunteer at Mother Theresa's houses. Like a lot of other Tokyoites, She is always in motion, and following her when we would ride bicycles taught me more about how to weave through people and maintain speed on Japanese streets than anything else. She self-described herself as 50-60% Christian the first year I was in Japan, and we used to sit in cafes and talk about God and deep things until midnight...and then some of her other Christian friends did some hurtful things like tell her that they couldn't really be friends with her if she didn't become a Christian. I lent her a book about Christianity and she vanished for a year, returning to let me know she was worried I didn't want to be her friend either since she couldn't become a Christian or believe in God. Though I reassured her that what she believed wouldn't affect our my friendship towards her, we haven't talked much since that first year at Hongo...she showed up from time to time to ask for help on English corrections for resumes or papers, but she seemed to have that wall of politeness up that tells me all is not quite well in a relationship. I was starting to fear I wouldn't hear from her again.

I woke up yesterday to the first email from Ayumi in eons. It was wishing me a happy birthday, and then also that she had some news to tell me. She got baptized on April 25th!!! I've been walking around at gymnastics these past two days with a secret smile. It's one of those joys that there is literally no way to express in words. There is no way to write down how much it means to see someone I've spent hours speaking with...prayed for with tears...longed for so badly it ached... I long stopped hoping that I would actually *see* Ayumi start following Jesus. She's the first person I've ever seen cross that line.

Return to the virtual world

My memorial day was spent running two errands I've been wanting to run for a long time. One was to take my poor, crippled computer into the Apple Store to figure out why it was dead and how much it would cost to make it undead. The other was to visit a bicycle store and continue my search to find a bike I will love enough to ride on a regular basis. This has been a crazy season of trusting God for money. I made the decision a couple months ago that, no matter how much I was living paycheck to paycheck, I was going to tithe anyway. I've lectured people before about how tithing isn't a legalistic thing, but a declaration of trust. It's one thing to be able to tell that sermon. It's a completely different thing to look at a $500 paycheck, $375 of which will be used for rent...to say nothing of other bills...and decide to place a tenth of it back in God's hands. Questions come up like, "If God is merciful, why would he expect this of me? He does want me to be able to eat, right?"

Then things happen like broken computers, moves away from the person who was providing a mattress for me...

It's been a strange season of life financially. I walk into stores knowing what I have to buy, and those things are on sale. Much less supernaturally feeling, but no less God's blessing, friends and family members have been so generous with me. My parents visited and bought Becc and I a cartload of groceries--which was the reason we had food that month when we had to pay all kinds of up-front rent. My parents were also the reason I was able to buy a bicycle yesterday. Friends have fed me dinner so that we could afford to spend time eating together. Theresa (my old housemate) gave me and Becc so much I will be in her debt forever. Maybe the cool thing about this season is gaining the ability to be thankful and to receive with open hands. I think being able to receive freely and with joy is one of the heart abilities that makes it possible to give cheerfully in return. It's realizing that everything on earth is God's, and that He has been generous with me to such an extent that there isn't fear in poverty. And there is a kind of crazy, cheerful generosity that is possible when there is little. I now feel this little surge of victory every time I'm able to give away my tithe. That knowledge that, if God didn't exist and care for me, it would be insanity to put money in the offering plate.

When I was getting ready to go home to the States, one of the things that made me (in a very Pamela way) excited was the thought that I would have the ability to trust God in the midst of an economic crisis. But my imagination of this was still very American...I imagined that I would have plenty, and that I would be able to give, and open my home, etc. I did not imagine that my vision for a house would become a safe place for my sister as she needed a new start. Or a safe place for my boyfriend as he is in the ranks of unemployed people, and probably in a stage in life where God is teaching him how to receive and trust too. Funny how we always imagined that the poor will be strangers. I certainly never imagined that I would hardly be making enough money to know exactly how things would be taken care of. There was a point when I was making a list in my head of ways poverty was far less romantic than I had somehow previously pictured. I think much of this list was composed in January. Because poverty means you can't skip work if you're sick but well enough to make it there, even if it is 0 degrees outside and you have to walk for half an hour.

On the other hand, living with little gives opportunities for God to show off in his generosity. And yesterday was one of those days. I brought my computer into the Apple Store because I knew that they would tell me what was wrong with it for free. I assumed this would mean I would have to hide away any extra money I could earn for potentially months and then hopefully get it fixed. Because something else I've learned these past few months is that I'd rather have a working computer than a mattress. I need to be connected with my "community across an ocean". I also need to be able to rest by researching silly things (I had no idea how often I do this until my computer was gone...). So, I scheduled an appointment, gave it to them, explained all my problem solving attempts.

The apple store "genius" told me that apple will fix anything hardware for $280 if we shipped it in. This is a flat rate...so, even if the display, the board, and the hard drive were fried, they would replace all three for $280. This was already sounding much better than I'd feared. Then he said they could possibly fix it in house, and booted it from an external hard drive. The diagnostic showed that it was indeed my hard drive that was fried. He asked a few more questions, and then told me, "Actually, we're authorized to replace a hard drive on this model for free, and it will have more space than the one you have now." I have no idea how this all worked out...I didn't ask questions aside from, "Are you for real?!?!" I have no warranty on my computer. They just...gave me a hard drive. I have a working computer.

I don't believe in a prosperity gospel. I'm bothered greatly by the idea that believing in Jesus means we're entitled to anything material. But sometimes love is spoken in material ways, and God speaks that language too. He is not a Santa Claus, granting our every wish and meeting our American materialistic desires. But he does provide, and he can be trusted, and we can give victoriously and generously because of it.

The Lord is my shepherd; I have everything I need. :-)